Recall
by threebears
Summary: Years ago, Tracer made a promise. No matter how many times it lands her in Widowmaker's sights, she intends to keep it. Luckily for her, Widowmaker can never seem to pull the trigger. (Rating may change/X-posted from ao3)
1. Blink

Widowmaker wonders, not for the first time, why she still has to blink.

She was molded in the image of perfection, as far as assassins are concerned. Talon had spared no expense, so she's been told (reminded) times beyond counting. Kept soothingly void of emotion and memory by a regularly scheduled chemical cocktail, outfitted with painstakingly crafted gear and augmentation. They'd even managed to find a way to slow her heart rate without killing her outright, all for the maintenance of their most prized asset.

They'd created a living human with the emotional range and brutal efficiency of the world's most lethal spiders. Yet her eyes still dry out after being open for too long.

It irritates her, as much as she's capable of feeling such a thing. A spider has no need to blink, and a sniper hasn't the time to. A momentary lapse in visual contact is counter-intuitive to the very nature of her job. This would be the case even if her quarry moved at the most natural of human gaits. And hers, most decidedly, does not.

Widowmaker's jaw tightens in tandem with her trigger finger at the trademark hum that signals her arrival. She hadn't known that time itself could make a sound, though she doesn't suppose there has been much research into the subject given that there is only one person on earth who could snap it like it were a dry twig. She scans the alley from her rooftop perch, but when Tracer pops back into time and space, the sniper finds that her aim is off by a more than generous degree. By the time she corrects her position, there is a flash of light and an empty alley greeting her sights. Not the slightest suggestion of chestnut hair or a trademark smarmy giggle.

She sighs and disengages her infrared goggles, swiping the back of her hand over a stinging eye. Talon supplied her with enough intel on Tracer's intended destination and the most likely route she'd take. She didn't typically need an entire route; just a single point of contact would do for her. One location, one target. One bullet. Yet her current target is capable of hurtling through the fabric of time itself. She could manipulate her way through it in such a way that the question isn't simply where she is at any point, it's also _when_.

Widowmaker's teeth click as she flicks the legs of the tripod from under her rifle. She'll move north over London's rooftops, follow Talon's tentative intelligence, and try to intercept the target further down the road. Pushing to her feet with languid grace (she was told she was once a dancer), she holsters her rifle on her back. She expects she will be able to head Tracer off in approximately three minutes, forty-two seconds, if all goes according to Talon's plan.

What she does not expect is a gentle tap on the shoulder.

"I think you're gettin' rusty, luv."

Widowmaker wheels away, goggles dropping to position over her eyes. Her rifle is drawn sooner than she can fully turn to face her chirpy assailant. Her jaw is clenched. She berates herself for not considering the fact that of course Tracer knew she was being watched. The tiny Overwatch agent, for all her bluster, is far more intuitive than she lets on. Widowmaker wonders how she neglected to remember that.

Tracer raises her hands in a placating gesture. It's all for show. Even if Widowmaker pulled the trigger right now, she can see that the woman's chronal accelerator is fully-primed. She'd yank herself backwards through time without batting an eyelid and be well beyond Widowmaker's range in a (regular human) heartbeat.

Yet.

It's still a risk, having the barrel of a gun pointed at your chest. Whether that chest allows you to swim through time itself or not. Widowmaker frowns slightly. Why is she here?

"Not gonna say hi, are ya?" Tracer says, her eyes a bright orange behind the tint of her goggles. Widowmaker knows their natural color without having to think about it. Knows that they're the lightest of browns, flecked with gold around the pupil. Why does she know that?

Because she's a mark, she testily reminds herself. She lowers her rifle a fraction of an inch.

"No." She answers stonily. Tracer's lip twitches, and Widowmaker cannot decipher whether it's the beginning of a smile or a grimace.

Perhaps Tracer cannot, either.

Her target moves back, the soles of her silly white shoes scraping against cement.

"You 'aven't killed me." The Overwatch agent remarks airly. Widowmaker tuts, raising her rifle once again.

"That is obvious, non?" She purrs, her mechanized goggles slowly sliding back over her forehead and disengaging. "But I could now, couldn't I?"

Tracer shrugs, lowering her hands. "You could." She says, all at once uncharacteristically serious. "But you 'aven't."

 _Why?_

The unspoken question hangs as heavy as the full London moon in the sky between them. Rationalizations roulette through Widowmaker's mind, but she knows them all to be false. She has followed Tracer for days now. She's had clear shots lined up, but she blinks. Talon supplies her with information about Tracer's movement patterns, but Widowmaker knows that they are, for the most part, wrong. Yet she follows them anyway, convincing herself that eventually Tracer will show up along one of the routes. When she does, Widowmaker never takes the shot. She blinks. Sometimes, she doesn't even have to.

Tracer knows Widowmaker won't take the shot. She seems confident enough to bank on it, even with a rifle trained on her point-blank, and _how can she be so sure_?

Widowmaker's throat is dry. She swallows and composes herself.

"The thrill of the hunt can be a satisfying thing in itself." She answers briskly. Tracer's eyes narrow, skeptical.

"Alright, luv." She says, and something in Widowmaker lurches at that.

Her jaw tightens so hard she wonders if her molars would shatter. Her head is beginning to throb, dull and slow. She looks down. There is something about the other woman that allows her to slide under Widowmaker's skin far too easily. She wishes she knew why. There is something so foreign about the Overwatch agent, yet so blisteringly familiar. It doesn't add up to any amount of sense.

" _Amélie_."

It is a whisper that Widowmaker barely even registers. Too soft, too tender for their circumstances. Too soft for who they are to one another.

The headache blossoms into a rosette of searing red fury. She growls, but she does not know why. Why that name sets something off inside of her, primal and defensive and raw.

She launches her body at Tracer, abjectly devoid of poise, grabbing a fistful of her jacket and pressing the barrel of her rifle dead on the glow at the center of her chest. The momentum throws them back into a steel exhaust flume, and Tracer grunts as her body meets the unforgiving surface. Still, she looks up at Widowmaker, the assassin towering and seething above her.

The tiny woman doesn't look frightened at all. In fact, there is something dancing in those damnable brown eyes, bathed in ochre hue. Widowmaker doesn't know what it could possibly be. She doesn't know emotion, she just knows when she sees it on other people. And Tracer's wide doe eyes swim with it. Whatever it is.

"You know that name, don't you, luv?"

The assassin tightens her grip, presses the muzzle of her gun right up against the chronal accelerator. Her heart beats slow, but harder, heavier than it ever had before.

" _Why_ do I know it?" Widowmaker hisses. The pounding at the base of her skull intensifies. Her fist shakes, and she screws her eyes shut, unable to keep looking into those wide, dancing eyes for a moment longer. The placid, intricately molded veneer was beginning to rattle apart at the hinges. All over a name and this damnable little girl.

Then... there are hands folding over hers.

They push down, gentle but insistent. Widowmaker releases her hold on Tracer's jacket and allows her rifle to lower until it points harmlessly at the rooftop beneath their feet. Something she distantly recalls as "warmth" radiates from where Tracer's hands rest atop hers. She does not open her eyes. She is exhausted.

"I promise I'll tell you. Next time, luv." Tracer whispers, her usual chirp filed down at the edges to something Widowmaker couldn't recognize. It sets something in her chest to ache, however briefly.

Slowly but steadily, she grows colder once more. Numbness creeps along the edges of her being and she shrugs back into it like a familiar overcoat. Her finger tightens on the trigger as she opens her eyes.

But with a flash of light and a keening hum, Widowmaker is alone on the rooftop again. As if she'd been alone this whole time.

Talon warned her such episodes could occur after her reconditioning. And that, if they did, she needed to resubmit herself to another round of treatment. Widowmaker knows that it would be the most prudent option to do so. She moves to press the homing beacon installed in her rifle, but stops as her finger grazes the button. She taps it idly, but not hard enough.

 _Hope._

Hope is what made Tracer's eyes dance under her gaze. Widowmaker does not even know how what hope is, necessarily, but she knows she saw it. She moves her finger away from the homing beacon and holsters the rifle.

Readying her grappling hook, she smiles softly to herself as she casts about for her next suitable perch. _Next time_ , she thinks.

 _Next time, I will not blink._


	2. Frayed Edges

As far as being a former member of a disbanded global defense program goes, Tracer supposes someone could do far worse than Overwatch.

While most of their technological and financial assets had been redistributed amongst the world's nations, and their major strongholds either razed or repurposed, most of the smaller satellite bases had managed to fly under the radar. The less-frequented locations, (with the exception of Mei's favorite base on the southernmost tip of Argentina), had gone quietly into the night with no protestation from the now-splintered team.

Tracer is grateful beyond measure that the safehouse in Nice has stayed more or less the same. It was always her favorite base to visit, whether it was for an assignment or simply to relax. She supposes it's stayed put because everyone feels much the same.

Perhaps the least ostentatious of Overwatch's properties, it's a squat, peach-hued two story building perched a couple hundred paces out from the sea. Nothing about the tenement's exterior betrays what goes on inside, and Tracer likes it that way. Nice was one of the very few towns on Earth that doesn't _need_ heroes.

Tracer loves being a hero. But Tracer also loves being Lena Oxton sometimes.

She can go outside here. She can wear trainers. She can visit cafes. She can wear a sodding tee shirt without worrying about hiding her chronal harness beneath it. And as long as she layers smartly, the glow of her chronal accelerator, ever present on her chest, is almost undetectable.

She could lay sprawled on a threadbare couch and leave the windows open without fear of a certain someone lighting her up from a distant rooftop.

Lena cracks her bare toes, arching her back as she stretches for good measure. She revels in it, allowing herself a small, satisfied grunt as she feels something pop along her spine. From the first floor, there is a loud CLANK as Zarya, (who else could it be), drops her weights on the floor of the designated gym area. In an adjacent room, she can hear Mercy murmuring to herself idly as she reviews their former companion's monthly health updates, sent per her request. Or, more accurately, thinly-veiled demand.

It's rare to have even two former Overwatch agents in one place at one time, three is damn near unheard of. It feels as close to old times as it would get, these moments when they all just happened into the same place at the same time.

She sighs, folding one leg over the other. Fishing in the pocket of her loose cloth shorts, the pads of her fingers graze a meticulously over-folded piece of paper. Trapping it between her index and middle fingers, she slides it out, unfolding it with the deftness that only comes with practice. Lena gazes at the picture, breath caught in her throat.

It feels as close to old times as it ever _could_ get.

She meets her own gaze, captured in the photograph as she mugs shamelessly at the camera. Her hair was shorter then. Neater. Her face a little rounder. Her chronal accelerator gleams proudly on her chest. Beside her, a man with neatly coiffed dark hair, thick glasses, and a smile wider than the grill of a sixteen-wheeler has an arm wrapped around a woman. Her smile is softer than her companions', close lipped but somehow warmer for it. Her hair, blacker than a crow's wing, is braided and thrown over one shoulder.

Her ochre eyes, the only thing that looks the same these days, are piercing beyond what ought to have been captured by a camera. Her heart thumps, like it always has. Lena traces the straight line of Amélie's nose with the tip of her pinky, the softest of sighs whistling through her lips.

God help her, but she _misses_ that woman.

"You are upsetting yourself again." Warns a stern voice from behind her.

Lena tips her head back to get an eyeful of a cross-looking, upside-down Angela Ziegler. She holds the picture up for the healer to get a closer look at.

"You took this picture didn't ya, Merce?" She asks, waving it for good measure. Angela purses her lips, her eyes narrowing almost imperceptibly.

"Yes." She says, voice tight. "Why do you carry it around with you, Lena?"

The small Brit rolls onto her backside, placing her bare feet on the hardwood floor.

"It's important to have a reminder, innit?" She asks softly, cradling the aging photograph like she would a baby bird. Angela heaves a weary sigh and practically floats to sit beside her. Lena takes this as a sign to continue.

"I swear to ya, Merce. I made progress with 'er the last time I saw 'er. In London." She says, sitting a little bit straighter. "I mean, she got right pissed, but innit that something for someone who can't feel _anything_?"

Angela makes a skeptical-sounding noise in the back of her throat, and Lena trains her gaze on her sharply. Heat flares under her cheeks.

"You got somethin' to say, then?" She asks. Angela shakes her head, folding her hands in her lap.

"Not anything I, or Zarya, or Winston, or , or Reinhardt, or _anyone_ hasn't said to you a thousand times before." She says softly, but there is a slight edge to her tone. Lena takes one last look at the photograph before folding it up and stuffing it back in her pocket.

"Right-o, then." She says briskly, zipping to her feet in a blink. Of _course_ it would be _this_ conversation again. Angela doesn't stand with her.

"You deliberately put yourself in danger every second that you spend with Widowmaker, Lena." The Swiss woman says firmly. "And for what _purpose_?"

Lena's jaw clenches as she flashes to her duffel bag, sitting in the corner of the room. Unzipping the bag tersely, she digs through its contents until she finds a pair of black jeans.

"You know better'n anyone else _for what purpose_." She snipes back. Angela finally rises to her feet, crossing her arms as she watches the shorter woman trip as she tries to hop out of her shorts.

"And I know as well as anyone that Amélie is gone." She says, softening her tone. "What Talon did to her cannot be reversed. Winston and I _both_ ran diagnostics when we had her in our custody."

Lena jams one spindly leg into her pants, then the other.

"You don't know 'er like I do, Angela." She says, gritting her teeth as she buttons her jeans.

"I know you two were close, but-"

"This isn't because we were _close_." She hisses. "I mean… we were. But this isn't just about 'er."

Lena's brows knit together as she bends over and fishes the photograph out of the pocket of her discarded shorts. She turns it in her fingers, the familiar wrinkles of the paper soothing her.

"I promised 'im somethin'."

She turns her gaze back to Angela, whose stern expression has all but fractured, and shakes her head. The healer watches her cross the room, sliding the picture back into the pocket of her jeans, and pick up her slip-ons. She slides the worn shoes over her narrow feet and grabs her wallet off an end table. Her eyes prick, suddenly feeling hot.

"He had no way to know what she'd become." Angela says, almost too quietly to hear.

Lena pauses, already one foot down the stairs. She bites her lip. A breeze rolling in from the sea causes the whole house to creak.

"Either way, Merce. I owe 'im."

And with that, Lena is gone, warping forward through time and out into the sunset-washed streets.

Nice doesn't need heroes. Lena needs that right now.


	3. Roil

For someone who was designed expressly for the purpose of never needing a home, Widowmaker feels as close to home as she conceivably _could_ on the rooftops of Ilios. At least, she believes that she would, were it possible.

The climate is moderate enough against her ever-frigid skin that it doesn't cause her discomfort. The breeze is slight enough that she never need worry about a gust knocking a bullet off-target. The population is dense enough to draw targets there, but small enough that finding a mark is never altogether difficult.

She supposes, in a way, that this is what home _must_ mean for her.

There is something else about the coastal town that draws her there, however. Something she cannot place. She wonders, as she has been with increasing frequency, if it has something to do with her life before. She knows, once, she was one of the civilian populace. But, beyond what information Talon has fed her regarding her life before, there is a dense fog clouding those memories. It doesn't frustrate her because she desperately longs to be privy to that information. Certainly not. Whoever she was before, that woman is dead.

Yet there is something inherently frustrating about living with a mind that is partially cordoned off to even its owner. Something _particularly_ frustrating to one with a mind as clinically methodical as her own.

Shaking her head as if to clear it of such thoughts, Widowmaker leans forward to gaze down the scope of her rifle once more. She's found her mark, but he's been sitting in a café for the past three hours. Too many opportunities for her bullet to catch an unsuspecting waiter in the temple.

Her intelligence on the mark is, as usual, not particularly insightful. He'd run afoul of Talon, recently. That is reason enough for her superiors to want him disposed of, so it is reason enough for Widowmaker.

After another twenty minutes of waiting, he finally moves. As his knees bend to stand, her crosshairs train on his head. A few more inches and her bullet's path would be high enough to pass cleanly through his skull without doing any collateral damage on the way out.

Three more.

Two more.

Her finger bears down gently on the trigger.

One more.

She squeezes.

 _Done._

Widowmaker releases a sigh, feeling her heart rate accelerate just enough for the faintest twinge of warmth to flit through her body. Holstering her rifle, she slinks deeper into the shadows as the familiar sounds of panic and horror finally begin to erupt from the street below. If there is one part of her job that tugs at her, however minutely, it is the localized terror that spreads surrounding a freshly downed mark.

But it isn't _her_ job to clean up afterwards.

She's aiming her grappling line when she hears a sound on the rooftop behind her. She doesn't give any indication that she's heard it, but she readies herself to bolt at a moment's notice, nonetheless. At this point, drawing her rifle would take too long. She considers, briefly, the pistol strapped to her outer thigh. But that would mean dropping her grappling line, therefore eliminating her only secure avenue of escape.

It's terribly sloppy of her to even _be_ in this situation.

Then she hears the hum.

Smiling, she drops her grappling line and draws her pistol, turning to point it at Tracer just as she flickers back into existence.

"Hiya, luv." She chirps, ever-oblivious to the gun levelled at her heart. Widowmaker sneers, watching the stupid girl closely.

"You're too late to save him." She says, allowing herself a hint of a gloating grin. Her eyebrows rise in shock as Tracer nods emphatically.

"Aw, yep. I saw that." She says with a sagely bob of her head. "Real bang-up job, that. Not a hair out of place on a single civilian. You're a master of your craft."

Widowmaker frowns.

"You're commending my successful assassination?" She asks, though it doesn't much sound like a question. She lowers her pistol. Not an interception attempt? What, then? Tracer seems to realize herself, nose wrinkling.

"Ah, I see why that'd seem odd to ya, luv." She says quickly. "Well, I'm not sure what exactly a fella like that would have to do to piss _Talon_ off, but Overwatch 'ad 'is number, back in the day. Arms trafficker, somethin' like that."

Widowmaker cracks the barest of smirks at that.

"You ought to be grateful to me for cleaning up your trash then, _non_?"

Lena rolls her eyes, hooking a thumb under one of the straps hugging her narrow thighs.

"More like our leftovers, yeah?"

Widowmaker's eyes narrow. Tracer beams back at her in response. They stay like that for a moment, gold burning into molten brown. After what feels like forever, the Brit is the one to break the silence, (of course).

"Seems like we're not necessarily enemies sometimes, dunnit?" She asks, her high voice small under the vast expanse of dark sky. Widowmaker chuckles, holding her pistol aloft briefly.

"You forget yourself." She says mildly. The way Tracer's wide eyes flicker does not go unnoticed. "I have your ' _number_ ' as well. It is only a matter of time before it is called."

Tracer tenses, then uncoils muscle by muscle. Widowmaker tracks the movement in her periphery. The younger woman tries her best to be nonchalant.

"What's stoppin' you from callin' it right now, luv?" She asks. For the first time, her question isn't bared as a taunt. She's legitimately curious.

Widowmaker is, once again, stumped.

She contemplates being honest with herself. With Tracer. Instead, she sneers.

"You make for excellent training." She says, steely. "You are, admittedly, the most amusing of my quarry."

Tracer's lips bend down incrementally, at that. Widowmaker is glad to see it.

"Sounds like a load'a bullshite, if you ask me." Tracer says, her tone gratingly harsh all of a sudden. She's angry; _that's_ an emotion Widowmaker can recognize. She's not programmed for emotional intuition, yet anger is not something she expects to see on the young Brit's face. It throws her for a bit of a loop.

Tracer shakes her head, mumbles something terse and low under her breath. Widowmaker's finger throbs to pull the trigger of her pistol. It would be so easy. Then there would be no more of this chronic annoyance. It would be back to business as usual. Her wrist twitches. She wants to do it. Every impulse that has kept her alive thus far screams at her to bury a bullet between this insufferable woman's eyes and be done with it.

There is another voice, though, and it screams at her not to.

The oddest thing about it is that it is her own voice.

She swallows hard.

"I… do not know why I play this game with you." She says, her words halting and cautious. She licks her lips, which have suddenly dried. Tracer's eyes find hers and she is drawn, seemingly on instinct, to their subtle glow. "It seems wrong, to kill you here."

The smaller woman's chest heaves, none too subtly. Widowmaker's eyes are drawn to the movement and there is that painful lurch once again. Tracer's lips part. She draws a breath in, slow and deliberate.

"We've been 'ere before, you and I."

Widowmaker frowns at that. She and Tracer? Together in Ilios? She rakes through the memories she has access to, trying to recall if Talon had ever clashed with Overwatch in the Grecian town. She's certain that they have never crossed paths here before. But there is a tug in the pit of her stomach that tells her she is _wrong_. She feels a ghostly sensation of thick, short hair, impossibly silky, threading through her fingers. A soft heaviness over her lips. A short gust of hot breath beneath her jaw. An ethereal warmth, molding impossibly tight against her body.

Her heart, here and now, speeds and stutters.

She takes a step back, as if burned. Another headache blooms in full at the base of her skull. Tracer takes a step forward, and Widowmaker screws her eyes shut.

"You _bitch_." She hisses, the vitriolic words spilling from her lips, hoping they will hurt enough to ward her away. Instead, slim fingers coil around her wrist, too warm. Widowmaker is immobilized as her palm is turned upward. A thumb skims, soft and sure, over the exposed vein on the inside of her wrist. She shudders, a sigh rattling forth from her lungs against her will.

A neatly folded piece of paper is deposited through her slack fingers, and suddenly, the hand that holds her hostage is gone. Widowmaker's eyes snap open, fixing Tracer with a look somewhere far beyond terrified.

"On your time, luv." She says, too kindly.

Blinking, Widowmaker takes two steps back before twisting around in full and breaking into a sprint. She dips to collect her grappling line, launching it toward a bell tower and jumping off the ledge of the building. She lets the tightening cord whip her through the air, far and away from this woman who has somehow managed to cripple her in every conceivable way. She whirls, aiming her pistol at the rooftop and fires until the clip is empty.

Tracer is already gone.

Widowmaker's legs nearly shatter upon impact with the body of the clock tower, but she holds herself there, unwilling to reel herself back up just yet. Her skull pounds to the threat of bursting. The piece of paper, securely trapped in the hand that holds her grappling gun, burns her with its residual warmth.

She waits for it to cool before slowly ascending to stable footing.


	4. Shatter

"Winston! A little 'elp 'ere?!" Tracer cries across the snow-laden plaza. She steps back, her chronal accelerator tickling through the center of her chest as she cuts through the stream of time to duck behind a car. The sound of gunfire popping against the opposite side makes her cringe, like it always does. Her breath puffs out, thick and white in the permafrost of the Russian air. The light of her accelerator is dimming. She's exhausted her abilities, for now.

Which means she really, _really_ needs Winston.

The body of an omnic rebel soars overhead, shattering into pieces upon contact with a light post, followed by a guttural roar. Tracer heaves a sigh of relief, glancing down to see that her accelerator is recuperating relatively quickly. With a faint hum, it kicks back on after its brief respite and she whoops loudly, readying her pistols as she scrambles to her feet once again after a brief struggle to find purchase in the slushy, frozen mire.

Tucking around the now irreparably damaged car in a tight angle, she glances to her left to see Winston ripping through omnics like they're made of tissue paper.

"Right-o, then. You got it 'andled, big guy." She says to herself, casting about the square once more. She notices that Zarya isn't having nearly as easy of a time with her group of assailants; they're pressing her into a corner. There's a limit to what those incessantly rippling biceps can do, Tracer supposes.

She zips across the square, reveling in the slight lurch of her stomach as she hurtles herself through the fabric of time. She skids to a halt, sliding through the snow a pace, and neatly buries a bullet through the chest of the omnic nearest Zarya.

 _The one thing I don't need biceps for, eh?_

"'EY! Watch 'vere you are shooting!" Zarya shouts, though Lena doesn't have to so much as look at her to know that the pink-haired behemoth is smiling.

"Not sorry!" Tracer quips, blinking from one angle to the next, picking off another omnic with a crisp headshot. She hobbles the next with a bullet through the knee, finishing the job with another expertly placed through the spinal column. It clangs to the ground as Zarya smashes the face of the last remaining omnic with the butt of her gun. _Electricity cannon?_ Tracer isn't sure how that thing works, even now. At this point, asking would be embarrassing.

Satisfied that the immediate danger to Zarya has passed, Tracer turns to offer her assistance to Winston only to find the scientist adjusting his glasses as he lumbers toward the two women on all fours. With a furrowed brow, he pauses in front of Tracer, flicking the chronal accelerator with a giant grey finger.

"It's powering down too quickly, I've noticed." He says, his voice rumbling deep from somewhere in his chest. "We'll get that taken care of."

Tracer folds her arms, but is secretly relieved that she wouldn't have to nag him to run a tune-up this time. He's been a busy gorilla lately, that one. Tracer wonders what he's been up to. Probably _not_ working out, if she knows Winston.

Which she does.

Brushing snow off the top of her head, she joins him and Zarya at the edge of the square, where they talk in low, hushed tones.

"It has been hard to deal with 'zem lately." Zarya is saying, her fingers rapping a sharp tattoo against the grip of her gun. "Every time 've 'zink 've are free of threat, 'zhey reorganize."

"Perhaps Zenyatta has insight?" Winston suggests, his heavy brow furrowing. "He's always been the best at talking down omnic splinter groups."

"It is impossible to get a hold of him." Zarya says, shaking her head. "Don't 'zink I haven't tried."

"Well, I imagine it's 'ard to get any old message all the way out to Nepal, yeah?" Tracer chips in, shrugging. "Zen prolly thinks we don't need 'im any more. It's been absolutely ages since any of us 'ave bothered 'im."

Winston sighs, pushing his glasses up.

"It seems as if he's needed again." He says, resigned. "If the continued rebellion is worsening here, he'd want to know at the very least."

"Especially 'vith 'vhat happened to Mondatta." Zarya murmurs in agreement. Tracer's jaw tightens, feeling a wave of nausea roll over her small frame. She tells herself it's a residual effect from using her accelerator so much in such a short time span.

"You guys go on back without me." She says, forcing herself to use her most convincing "I'm fine" voice. "I'll catch up with you in a few."

"Where are _you_ going?" Winston asks, equal parts concern and irritation. Tracer smiles in what she hopes is a reassuring fashion.

"Just gonna check the perimeter, luv." She says, waving a hand dismissively. "Make sure there aren't damsels in need of de-stressing."

Zarya chuckles and shakes her head, turning to head back to her base of operations. Winston grunts and moves to follow, but Tracer certainly does not miss the pointed look he shoots her way. Once his back is turned, she pulls a face at the oversized scientist, then blinks her way up the fire escape of the closest warehouse. Once at the top, her gaze sweeps over the rooftops, some arching inward with the ever-growing weight of snow. Her breath billows, a pantomime of the smoke rising from the stacks of countless rows of houses. Her throat is thick and her eyes sting, sharp little pinpricks stabbing at the corners.

She can't help it. They're not Overwatch any more. Not _really_. But still. It was still their job to do good; to help, no matter what.

Tracer failed, that night in London. The night Amélie (no, _Widowmaker_ ) assassinated Mondatta with a bullet that _she_ had dodged. And for what? Because of the husk of a woman she once knew?

Mondatta was the figure that had stepped in to hold together peace, however fragmented, after Overwatch was forced to disband. And now he's gone because the thought of seriously aiming a bullet at Widowmaker shattered her far more completely than _any_ amount of bullets the assassin could have ever put in _any_ omnic leader.

Tracer knows that it's true, so how good _could_ she be? How could she continue to chase this specter, moving through the world in the skin of Amélie Lacroix, and still say that she's doing the right thing?

She tears her goggles from her face, gripping them white-knuckled in her small fist.

 _I'm not good. I never have been. It's what landed me here in the first place._

She's tried so hard to justify the things she's done. The people she's hurt. Bury the names and faces of anyone she's left broken in her wake under the work she's done. But at the end of the day, there is always his headstone and a blue-lipped snarl to send it all screaming back as soon as she begins to forget. To forgive herself.

Tracer isn't even surprised at the hallmark sound of nonsensically high heels, mutedly clicking against the snow-cradled roof. She shakes her head, wiping errantly at her eye as she slides her orange goggles back over her eyes. She barely has it in her to feel guilty at the way her stomach flips in delight when she turns to find Widowmaker silhouetted in the ambient orange of the night sky.

Barely.

"I guess rooftops are our thing now, eh luv?" She quips, hoping the constriction of her throat goes unnoticed. Widowmaker doesn't answer, instead continuing her even pace toward Tracer. Her expression is hard. Tracer shifts back an inch.

"Finally gonna kill me, then?" She hazards, hand drifting toward a pistol in warning. But Widowmaker is unarmed. Entirely.

Well, likely not _entirely_ , but there is no rifle slung across her back. Tracer's brow knits. The French woman draws to a halt in front of her. Tracer has to crane her head back, trying to ignore the steady roil in her stomach building over their sudden proximity.

"Widowmaker." She says firmly, palm brushing the grip of her pistol.

" _Lena_."

There is no breath in her lungs. Her mouth is dry, crackling. Her heart thuds too slow, and the chill that has been working on her feet begins to creep up her calves.

"'Ow d'you…" She whispers, unable to string together anything more complete with the amount of air rasping about her chest. Widowmaker wrinkles her nose, dipping long fingers into a pouch at her hip. She pulls forward a folded square of paper. The same one Tracer had given her at Ilios. The younger woman's gaze flits frantically between Widowmaker and the note. Her tongue is numb, but she tries to sound it out regardless.

"You remember?"

Widowmaker frowns deeply, shaking her head. Unfolding the piece of paper gingerly, she holds it up for Tracer to read. She doesn't need to, of course.

"Non." She says, retracting her arm. "Not anything about an Amélie Lacroix. But seeing this name. I suddenly knew yours."

The last sentence is accusatory. Golden eyes narrow and so does Tracer's throat.

"I want to know _why_."

Tracer's mind is reeling. Too fast for even her to catch up with. She has never known what it might feel like to want to sing and vomit simultaneously, but she supposes it might feel rather like this. Lifting a trembling hand to her face, she slides her goggles down over her nose, cringing as the strap drags over her chapped ears. They dangle around her neck. Licking her lips, she steels herself.

She's thought about what this might be like, too many times to even count. No scenario she'd ever concocted could have prepared her for the sheer velocity of hope and fear burning straight through her.

Slowly, as if approaching a frightened deer, Tracer lifts her arms. Widowmaker's frown deepens, and Tracer braces for any sort of physical retaliation as her hands come to rest lightly on a pair of well-developed shoulders, holding the other woman at arm's length.

 _They were narrower._

"It's… a long story, luv." She says, slow and quiet as if anything louder could snap this sudden reverie in half. It absolutely could. "I'll tell it to you soon. Promise."

Widowmaker doesn't respond, her gaze rooted on one of the hands on her shoulder. Tracer tries to slide the offending intrusion away subtly. No sudden movements.

Instead, she finds herself being yanked forward by the fur-lined collar of her jacket, feet skittering helplessly over the snow. Widowmaker leans over her, eclipsing the inky orange sky as she looms. Tracer's back arches at a near-agonizing angle. Her heart hammers now. She is so close.

 _How long has it been?_

Breath, only marginally warmer than the scant air between them, fans over her lips. Tracer keeps her eyelids firmly open, though she's railing against her every instinct. She slips her hands down over Widowmaker's arms, stopping at her wrists. She presses her thumbs lightly into the cool, exposed flesh. Despite herself, a gasp tumbles from her lips at the gentle throb of a pulse. Slower than should be possible, but _there_. Lifting her gaze, she takes in the familiar, glasscutter of a chin that gives way to a gently sloped jawline. Full, parted lips she has missed for too long allow a glimpse of pearl-white teeth. Her nose, turned ever so aristocratically upward at the tip, guides Tracer's gaze ever upward to eyes. Those eyes. Her eyes.

Eyes she has not seen so desperate, so _alive_ , in years.

"You know why, _Amélie_." Tracer says softly, unable to move despite the way her muscles scream in protest at the way Widowmaker holds her. The taller woman's eyes flicker, and that is all the acknowledgment Lena Oxton can bear. With trembling calves, she pushes herself the remaining inch until their noses brush. Breath skitters away from both women in tandem, both sets of eyes wide and straining to maintain contact. Pressing the pads of her thumbs harder against the insides of Widowmaker's wrists, she shudders at the now undeniable thumping she feels there. Lena angles her face just so. Cool lips, softer than the snowflakes now melting in her hair, remain parted as she brushes her own against them.

Widowmaker inhales sharply, jerking her arms. _Up_.

They sigh where they collide. Lena notices that Widowmaker's mouth is much warmer than she had imagined. Relief pangs sharp against her ribs. She feels lips tremble as Widowmaker tilts to deepen their kiss, searching with steadily increasing fervor. Lena parts her lips, ever willing to aid her in her exploration as one arm slips out of her grasp to wind through her hair, cold fingers brushing against her scalp as she is tugged impossibly closer yet.

Lena remembers Amélie, feels her in every shudder and gasp and tug at the back of her head. She wonders if it's enough for Widowmaker to remember her, too.

 _Don't worry, love. I've remembered enough for the both of us._


	5. Coffee

It has been two weeks since she's been in Russia, and still Widowmaker can feel damnably soft lips dancing over hers. She tastes vanilla lip balm, earl grey tea, and warmth, somehow. There is the ghost of a lithe frame clinging desperately to her own, small hands scrabbling for any purchase over her stonily cold body. At the least convenient of moments, she can hear that insufferable giggle bubble up from absolutely nowhere, and though she knows it's all in her head, she still whirls to confront the source.

At this point, Widowmaker's most effective way to confront Lena is to send a bullet between her _own_ eyes.

The assassin frowns. _Tracer_ , she thinks to herself. _Not Lena, Tracer._

She has to admit to herself, she is still shocked at the memories stirred by seeing the name of a _long_ -dead woman in Tracer's hilariously poor and illegible scrawl. Widowmaker knows by now that Amélie Lacroix was once the name she went by, before being conscripted by Talon. But she is no longer that woman, and comfortably so. She has to imagine that Tracer believed _seeing_ the name would somehow… _reverse_ Talon's conditioning.

That, of course, is entirely impossible.

However, Widowmaker is not certain that her memory can be suppressed forever. Otherwise, how would seeing her former name stir the knowledge of Tracer's _real_ name?

She tucks her chin, taking a contemplative sip of blisteringly hot coffee. Black.

They knew each other, before. That much is certain. And she had _no_ control over her own reaction to Tracer's presence, now two weeks past.

It seems as if they once _knew_ each other, indeed.

Widowmaker has seen hide nor hair of the Overwatch operative since their rooftop rendezvous, and it has given her time for perspective. For cooling. For analysis. Because she no longer trusts her own mind when she is around that woman. A dangerous thing, for someone like her. She was designed to keep a nearly corpse-like calm in all situations. Emotionally barren and physically unresponsive. Tracer tweaked at it, though. Toyed with her, yet remained almost embarrassingly earnest in their every interaction.

It has taken her weeks to come to terms with it, but Widowmaker felt _something very new_ upon remembering the name Lena Oxton. It was almost too brief for her to put a name to. The closest approximate feeling would be that of when she only barely misses her target. A desire to go back, shoot again, do it _right_.

Longing? Wistfulness?

She grits her teeth, long fingers tightening around the coffee cup. Normally, the heat of the ceramic mug would have been too much for her to handle against her unnaturally frigid skin. Now, she finds the discomfort somewhat grounding. At least _this_ is present. Tangible.

She glances at the note on the white marble slab that constitutes her kitchen island. The only item resting upon it, aside from a solitary black placemat, is the note. She has only looked at it once. Once was enough. Since then, it has remained dutifully folded.

She leans back against her kitchen counter. Her apartment, an obscenely large and open loft space, is grey in the hazy-pre dawn. Everything is comprised of sharp angles, geometric certainty. To any civilian, the loft may seem too cold, too austere. For Widowmaker, it makes _sense_. Everything black, white, grey. Crisp and orderly. It is clean, and it is _her_.

There are times, though, where she finds her mind drifting idly far, far away from the even planes and cool serenity of her apartment. To somewhere decidedly very different.

She has spent enough time in Ilios, throughout her travels, to recognize the hallmark white limestone and heavy tang of salty sea breeze that manifests in her memory. There is squat, heavy-looking wooden furniture; a dresser sequestered to one corner of the small bedroom she finds herself transported to, and two rickety chairs flanking a large window, shutters and panes cast open. The room itself is a mess, and it makes her squirm to consider that at one point, she would have allowed such squalor. Every flat surface is a collection point for various forms of detritus. Wine bottles, some empty, some practically so. Scattered articles of clothing, wrappers, haphazard stacks of books and wrinkled papers.

She remembers the coarse linen sheets tangling around her legs on a hot afternoon. A sticky sheen of sweat clinging to her bare body. She stretches and feels ghostly coils of pleasure rattle up her spine with each satisfying _pop_.

Widowmaker gnaws her lower lip, wildly offset (as usual) by the sense of contentment the memory brings her. Despite herself, she allows it to consume her. It is the only memory of _before_ that she can summon and yet, it is so vivid. She can really feel the waning sun play ghostly frames of warmth across her chest and cheeks. She can feel threadbare fabric against the calloused flats of her feet. She can smell the ocean, the yeasty scent of a bakery across the street, strong coffee beginning to brew down the hall.

She can hear a voice, as if she were still there, years ago. A cockney chirp so desperately out of place in the Grecian inn, drawing nearer. In her memory, she recalls the feeling of her heart pumping quicker. Not out of fear. It is odd, Widowmaker muses, that such a feeling can become lost in translation.

She remembers the thump of bare feet approaching the room, a door swinging open. The smell of coffee is stronger, now.

 _Lena_.

Widowmaker wants to correct herself, but she knows who _this_ is. This apparition is not Tracer. With her chestnut hair ruffled, wrinkled white t-shirt, loose baby blue cotton shorts, free of any indication of her chronal accelerator save for a faint blue glow at the center of her chest. Easy smile yielding rows of white teeth, dark eyes cast almost orange in the bleeding sunset.

No, this is the woman Amélie Lacroix knew as Lena Oxton. Twenty-three years old, born and bred in King's Row. Former pilot turned savior of humankind. Insufferable and charming. Drinks coffee and tea with atrocious quantities of milk and sugar. Talks in her sleep. A friend, a protector.

 _Her lover_.

It explains why Widowmaker knows the exact constellation of freckles sprayed over her sunburnt cheeks. Knowledge she carries in her back pocket to this day. Explains why they both buckled so easily into one another on that snowy rooftop.

Widowmaker cannot _feel_ love; not in any firsthand sense of the word, at least. However, with the spectral sensations of memory engulfing her so thoroughly, she feels as though she is close to _understanding_ it.

She wonders what Tracer hopes to gain, leaving these breadcrumbs so persistently. What she could possibly stand to gain, fighting to eke emotion out of a woman who _can't_ ever love her again? Widowmaker traces a fingertip idly around the rim of her coffee cup. Her drink has gone far too cold to be enjoyed, at this point. She sighs, setting the ceramic mug down on the marble counter with a soft _clink_.

She doesn't think she can love again, at least. Talon had never thought to run diagnostics on any cognitive responses having to do with affection. Which makes sense. Strip emotion, and love will have no purchase to grow upon. Yet here she stands, in her grayscale kitchen, pondering what a splash of orange might do for the place.

For sanity's sake, she really should have thrown herself at Talon's feet by now. Beg and plead and grovel to be reconditioned. Truly, this affliction is nothing a little tune-up can't fix. If anything, she is certain that her employers would reward her duly for turning herself over before anything could go truly awry.

Widowmaker folds her arms. She glances at the note that still sits on the island. Even though the notebook paper blends innocuously enough against the white marble slab, its contents are far more conspicuous to her to avoid any longer. She takes a breath to steel herself and begins to slowly unfurl the white ruled paper. Her motions are deliberate and composed, but her throat tightens microscopically as she flattens out the creases.

Her eyes flick over the page, but at this point it's a formality. The predictably hasty scrawl has danced behind her eyelids for weeks now. She ghosts the pads of her fingers over the paper, memorizing the dips and valleys where a pen had pressed too hard.

A name. _Her_ name. _Was_ her name. Amélie Lacroix.

Beneath it, though, coordinates. Coordinates she had been pointedly avoiding looking up, yet somehow had an inkling of where they would lead her.

 _45.8992° N, 6.1294° E_

 _I'll see you there when I see you there, luv._

Widowmaker folds the note back up. She slides it into the back pocket of her dark jeans and strides toward her front door, picking up an already-packed black duffel on the way out.

She's known that she would cave, eventually. All this time. They both have.


	6. Ceasefire

Lena's knee bobs up and down furiously. Everything about what she's doing is a bad idea. The worst idea. The absolute _worst_.

Ordinarily when she courts danger, she at least comes prepared with an arsenal of aces up her sleeve. Even when in civilian kitting, she's at least packing a modest amount of heat. Nothing flashy; a peashooter pistol has always served her well in a pinch. This time, however, she allowed emotion to interfere. She convinced herself that if she's to be earnest in any attempt to crack through Widowmaker, she needed to be transparent head-to-toe. Which was a stupid thing to think.

If Winston or Mercy or Reinhardt or Torbjörn or _anyone_ were to find out what she's up to, shadowy figures preying on her would be the very least of her concerns.

Regardless; stupid, stupid. _Stupid_.

Lena doubts the assassin will even show up at all. If she does, she'll likely be towing that damnably clunky rifle with her. Leaving Lena outsized and outgunned in equal measure.

And, whether she shows up or not, Lena is still sitting in the wild blue open, as devoid of protection as she's been since she was born, probably.

Stupid.

 _At this point, I really deserve to be assassinated._

Groaning, she zips up her hoodie a little higher to ward away the chill rolling off the mountains that surround Annecy. She wraps her hands around the dainty ceramic mug that the French waiter had unceremoniously dumped, (and that's really the only word for it), tea into. She'd asked for the most English variety they had in stock, which was, again, begging to be made a target of.

Her head just isn't in the right place today. Being back here, in this town, was enough on its own to drive her absolutely batty. Why she thought inviting Widowmaker here was a fine idea is well and truly beyond her.

She probably won't even show up, Lena reasons with herself. What reason would she have for showing up? Aside from a rather heated spell of making out on a rooftop and memories only _Lena_ was privy to in the first place, what would inspire the French woman to follow her to a place like this? _Anywhere_ , really? Every time Lena so much as hedges around the topic of Amélie Lacroix, Widowmaker looks fit to burst. Sometimes that means violence, and apparently at other times it means frantic kissing. Either way, she's very obviously uncomfortable.

Lena drops her face into her hands, heaving a sigh. She shouldn't have fussed, shouldn't have meddled. She is juggling a pressure bomb, unsure of exactly how much prodding it will take to set it off. But she promised Gérard that she would take care of Amélie, or Widowmaker, or _whoever_ she is. She'd have done it anyway, but having his earnest voice rattling around her skull every damn day only stoked the pyre she would burn on for this woman.

This is the very same café he had brought her to, all those years ago. Two weeks after Amélie had miraculously reappeared. They sat inside, to escape from the lashing, howling wind that had plagued the city for a week at that point. Lena glances through the windows to the table where they sat, two untouched cups of black coffee between them. Gérard's dark eyes, normally alight with good humor, were shadowed and glassy. His hair hung limp and unwashed over his forehead.

" _She is different, Lena."_ He had told her, voice trembling. _"Trauma aside, she is different. When she was returned, all was well. But now… her skin is too cold, her heart beats too slow. She blinks and walks and talks, yet she barely breathes."_

Different, different, _different_. The word rumbled across her mind, a warning of an oncoming storm.

" _You love her. Something I never imagined I would be grateful for."_

Even now, Lena's gut lurches at that.

" _You must promise me; whatever happens, you will search for Amélie. And you will protect whoever she is now. I am uncertain that I will be able to do so."_

She should have gone with him.

" _Tell no one of what we discussed."_

" _Take care, mon amie."_

That was the last time she saw Gérard. Hours later, she awoke to Winston's immense hands shaking her, tears in his eyes that would not spill. His neck had been snapped. A clean break, Mercy said. He likely felt nothing.

Lena has never believed that.

With a shaking hand, she lifts her teacup to her lips and takes a long drink. The former Lacroix home was not a five-minute walk just down the road.

She has replayed that day in her mind every other hour in the years since. A life claimed to be spent adventuring is a front, she knows. Since Gérard Lacroix's death, her purpose has been nothing but Amélie. Finding her, recovering her, protecting her.

Or, more likely, laying her to rest.

Gérard couldn't have known the extent to which Talon had claimed their stake of his wife. And in the (what feels like) a lifetime since, Lena has come to realize that the woman they both fell in love with is gone. Parts of her might remain, and Lena can do nothing but hope that the scattered fragments that she can dredge up are enough to keep her body free of bullets.

Finishing her tea, she places the cup back down on the saucer, the ceramic rattling in her trembling grasp. She nods her thanks to the waiter when he collects the dirtied dishes and leans back in her chair, watching clouds roll overhead.

Oh, but how she misses being up _there_.

Before she can ruminate in her gloom even more, however, there is a light hand on her shoulder. Fighting every instinct to speed away, Lena turns at a measured pace she _believes_ would be entirely appropriate for any ordinary human being.

Briefly, she wonders if she's finally lost her mind. It's _Amélie_.

Dark hair spills loosely over her shoulders thick and abundant, free of Widowmaker's trademark visor. She is clad in a black turtleneck and jeans, though both are still torturously well-fitted. In her hands, she holds a small clutch in a white-knuckled grip.

Her skin. _It isn't blue._

Lena has not seen this woman in years. Her eyes feel hot as she continues to stare, drawn to any expanse of lightly olive-toned skin she could find.

"It-it's… 'ow did you… I… I'm sorry." She manages to splutter, a blush heating her cheeks. She rises to her feet on rattling legs. "You aren't blue." She finally gets out, her voice low. Widowmaker, (but God almighty it's _Amélie_ staring at her like she's an abject moron), cocks an eyebrow. Wordlessly, she holds up her wrist to show Lena the thin, faintly pulsing band of light wrapped around it.

"Cloaking." The assassin says flatly. Before she is able to drop her arm, however, Lena darts her hand out to catch it. Her heart sinks a little when she realizes that Widowmaker's skin is as frigid as it's ever been.

"Sorry." She says softly, releasing her grip. The pads of her fingers skirt down the length of Widowmaker's forearm as she lets both their arms swing back to their sides. She can't help it, really. She should try harder, though.

An awkward silence settles between them, much to Lena's surprise. She hasn't ever considered that it would be _possible_ , given Widowmaker's propensity for using gunfire to fill gaps in conversation. She clears her throat, gesturing to the table she previously was sitting at. Without a word, Widowmaker takes the seat opposite her, crossing her legs quite tensely. Lena doesn't think she's ever seen the woman more on-edge. She breathes in heavily, steeling herself for something she honestly did not believe would happen. Before she can get a word out, however, she is cut off.

"Tell me why I am here."

Lena's mouth snaps shut.

"I was sorta hopin' you might fill me in on that." She says, studying Widowmaker intently. Her jaw is taut, and there is something like hesitation clouding those molten eyes. "I didn't think you would."

Widowmaker's nostrils constrict.

"I did not, either." She admits, folding her hands in her lap. Lena leans forward an inch.

"But I…" She begins, but falters. She gnaws on her bottom lip. "I remembered too much to not have questions."

Lena's heart leaps.

"You remembered? Remembered what?" She asks, unable to keep her voice from jumping half an octave. Widowmaker's gaze drops, brow furrowing. Then, she lifts her head to pierce Lena with that gaze, all at once blisteringly cold and searing with intensity.

"I remembered you. Or, more specifically, _us_."

Lena tenses. That isn't the revelation she's been hoping for. Oh, it's a revelation, to be _sure_. But she had not once considered the possibility that Widowmaker's memory would be selective in what it revealed. She wishes she hadn't guzzled her tea down so quickly; her mouth is very dry. Drumming her fingers in a muffled staccato against the tabletop, she tries to conjure a response.

She opts for honesty. She's already miles deep in the shit. What difference could another couple hundred meters deep possibly make?

"There was an _us_ at one point, yeah." Lena says, her voice barely larger than a whisper. "It was complicated."

Widowmaker opens her mouth, likely to probe at that point, but Lena raises a hand to interrupt.

"Whole can'a worms there, luv." She warns. "Not sure it's somethin' either of us are ready to poke around in just yet."

The French woman frowns slightly, but nods nonetheless. Lena rests her elbows on the table, folding her hands beneath her chin. She's going to have to tread lightly. It's hard to tell what might set Widowmaker off, but she's desperately more concerned about what that would do to _her_ , not Lena. She sighs.

"We were real in love, if you can believe that."

"I can." Widowmaker says, almost instantly. "I can't feel it. It's all quite theoretical to me. But I can associate the theory, the feeling, with you quite clearly."

Lena makes a small noise in the back of her throat. She's fuzzy on whether she should be happy about that or not.

"Is that why you are so incessantly irritating?" Widowmaker asks. "Because of what we were?" Her tone isn't sharp enough to be derisive, which is an odd color on her. She sounds curious, albeit unsure how to do so politely. Lena snorts quietly.

"If ya ask nicer, I might answer that." She teases. Widowmaker's eyes narrow; Lena cocks an eyebrow. Finally, the assassin sighs mightily.

"Is that why you pursue me with such regularity?" She grinds out. Lena decides that'll do. She chews the inside of her cheek.

"No. Well, yeah. It's part of it." She admits. She tries to ignore the gallop of her heartbeat. "What you remember "theoretically" is somethin' I remember in a very not-theoretical type'a way. But I got my other reasons. _Plenty_ of 'em."

"Such as?" Widowmaker presses. Lena notices she's inched forward in her chair just a tinge.

 _It's not lying if you don't tell her absolutely everything just yet._

"I want you to feel again." She says. And it's true. It's absolutely true. Probably the truest thing she's said in her whole weird sodding life. "It's selfish and all, yeah. But I guess I figured… maybe if I hounded you just enough, maybe you would find yourself feelin' again. If it worked, then at least you'd 'ave the choice to leave Widowmaker behind."

A heavy silence falls over the pair. Widowmaker's eyes lock tightly to Lena's own. She feels years younger, gripped in the gaze of a woman that she loved more than life itself. Who she knew loved her back, just as much. There is nothing foreign about the way Widowmaker looks at her _now_ , which is why she isn't truly surprised when the other woman finally breaks the silence.

"Perhaps it is time I consider it, then."


	7. Stride

Widowmaker is taken aback by how easy it feels to walk beside Tracer. The ever-present familiarity gnaws persistently at her edges, and she has to beat back the instinct to whirl on any sudden movement in her periphery. So perhaps _easy_ isn't the right way to describe it, but it certainly isn't as dreadful as she'd expected it to be.

For her part, the tiny Brit has remained unusually quiet in comparison to her near-constant chirp and drawl. Perhaps the silence is what Widowmaker is truly comfortable with. So she tells herself. She wonders what's got Tracer's tongue, though she knows she should simply be enjoying the respite. She studies the smaller woman out of the corner of her eye. Her hands are jammed in the pockets of the tragically threadbare grey hoodie draped over narrow shoulders. The chestnut tufts of hair crowning her head stick up even more wildly than usual, as impossible as it may seem. Widowmaker saw her tugging at it worriedly while doing recon prior to their rendezvous at the café.

She might inquire, she might not. Widowmaker isn't really sure what to make of any of it. As much as she relishes the sudden peace and quiet, it is jarringly out of character for Tracer.

She fixates on her companion's silence, although she still hasn't figured out why she cares. It's an anomaly, to be certain; anomalies can be dangerous. It's entirely possible she's being led into a trap.

Perhaps guilt is claiming the diminutive Overwatch agent, having cast her lot in with one of the most-wanted criminals on the earth. Perhaps she wrestles with second thoughts. That seems incredibly likely. The risk that Talon's programming will override their tenuous alliance isn't a small one. Still, Widowmaker cannot deny that her stomach drops a fraction at the thought.

She worries her lower lip with meticulously-whitened teeth before remembering her lipstick. She smooths a thumb over, hoping that the purple skin beneath remains concealed. The words nip at the back of her throat, aggravatingly simple. She nibbles at a cuticle, willing them forth. To no avail.

Fortunately, a pair of doe-brown eyes turned toward her sympathetically curtail her stumbling thoughts entirely.

"Bet this is a real sight for ya, eh luv?" Tracer says wearily, though not without a dose of cheer. Her voice is far more measured than is typical, however. Widowmaker can't help the slightest quirk of her lips in return.

"There is much on your mind, I assume?" She asks simply, grateful for the silence to have been broken.

Tracer rolls her shoulders. Widowmaker follows the lithe movement. The primitive beginnings of a memory summon a flash of compact muscle rippling beneath alabaster skin, sprayed with freckles. She looks at her feet. One in front of the other.

"I feel like that might be a given, yeah?" The tiny Brit quips, hands still balled in the pockets of her hoodie. "Didn't even think I'd get this far. Don't 'ave a plan, now that you're 'ere. Not trying to kill me."

Widowmaker raises her eyebrows at that. Tracer laughs, loudly and earnestly.

"I know, I know. I've 'ad so much time." She says, shaking her head. "For all the times I've fantasized about this, too. Maybe that's why I dunno what to do, yeah? Too much expectation."

The Frenchwoman averts her eyes down the boulevard. She is unsure of what to say. She certainly cannot relate. Fantasy is a flight of fancy she is unable to justify. She needs to _know_ what to expect as concrete fact, not muddy the waters of reality or probability with haphazard daydreams. Not that she wouldn't like to; time would certainly pass much more quickly and pleasurably, were she able to selectively pluck herself from the present. It simply isn't something she is _able_ to do. It must be easy for Tracer, though, if her mind moves as tangentially as her lissome little frame does through time and space.

"I didn't expect I'd ever stop fighting you." Widowmaker admits. "Yet here we are."

"'Ere we are." Tracer echoes.

They lapse into silence, the only sound shared between them the sound of their shoes on the pavement. Widowmaker's heels click sharply in contrast to the muted scuffle of trainers. Their elbows brush occasionally; innocuously. It is still enough to breathe life into Widowmaker's nerves. The contact spurs nearly-painful crackles of energy through her frozen body. She keeps her gaze dutifully trained ahead.

"So, ah." Tracer interrupts, her voice apologetic. "You said you remember _us_."

" _Oui_." Widowmaker responds, hazarding a glance at the shorter woman beside her. Molten brown eyes meet sharp gold, cautiously curious.

"Can I ask what exactly it is you remembered?" Tracer asks. "If ya don't feel like sharin', I understand. I just wanted to know what brought ya 'round."

Widowmaker can't help the smirk that curls the edges of her lips.

"Ilios. The inn." She says simply. Tracer's cheeks turn a very sudden, possibly alarming shade of pink. The flush rolls heat from the Brit in waves, and Widowmaker takes a deep breath she doesn't need.

"Oh." Tracer chokes out, rubbing the back of her neck, tugging at the wispy hair there. "Okay. I 'spose that'd do it, yeah."

Widowmaker's gaze rakes up and down the stammering, blushing little thing before her. The Tracer she recalls now was a far cry from this. All lazy movement and sinewy power, self-assured to a fault as they tangled themselves around one another.

Although, now that she thinks about it, there _were_ moments of stammering and blushing. Decidedly more cursing, however.

Tracer clears her throat. The rosiness still clings to her freckled cheeks, but her eyes are a touch clearer.

"And that was enough to make you wanna change?" She asks. Widowmaker frowns. _Change_?

The brunette appears to recognize her misstep and raises her hands, apologetic. Widowmaker purses her lips.

"I am curious. Nothing more." She says, assuming a brisk tone. "I am… different than you. Or any other human, I would assume. But I wish for autonomy. I _was_ someone, once. Someone that I no longer am. This… Amélie, she is gone. But she made choices, _non_? She chose to love you."

Tracer winces, just the barest amount, but nods for Widowmaker to continue.

"I have not considered that there might be choices that yet remain to be made. Perhaps the thought interests me. I had not considered it." She says, scratching the insides of her palms lightly. "Not until you reminded me that once, I did have a choice. And you are the only one to extend their hand. I have not been able to discern if that means anything, but it is a better offer than I can ever recall receiving."

They've stopped walking. Tracer's jaw flexes as she combs through what's been said. As if by reflex, Widowmaker lifts a hand to graze the pads of her fingers coolly across the sharp angle of her jawbone. A warm breath flutters against her wrist at the contact. She does not miss that Tracer's eyes have grown nearly black, and she feels a slight tug deep in the pit of her stomach.

" _Et je ne me sens pas la moitié comme mort quand je suis avec vous_."

"I don't speak French, luv." Tracer murmurs, heavy-lidded. Widowmaker's fingers slip from her jaw to gently ghost over parted lips, almost impossibly warm to touch. She is not sure what spurs her forward, to touch this woman, her most dogged adversary, in such a gentle way. It is a gentleness that she isn't able to rationalize. Something she shouldn't even be capable of. Amélie touched Tracer like this. Far too soft. Wistful fingers twitching over expanses of pale, warm skin. The touch is full of something that does not make sense to Widowmaker. But still, she traces the bow of an upper lip, reverent, on pure instinct. _Instinct_ makes sense to her. She can work with this, for now.

"We should find somewhere private so that we may speak at length, _non_?" Widowmaker murmurs, eyes raking over her quarry. Her savior. Her worst nightmare. Tracer shudders, pulling back. She says nothing, eyeing the assassin carefully with shadowed pupils. Widowmaker wonders if she did something wrong. She cannot tell. Then, a rasping cockney accent cuts through the weighty silence.

"Yeah. I know just the place."


End file.
